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Giada Labrecque
0945860
James Specyal
November 23, 2011
Spinoza’s Conception of a Corporeal God
Throughout time, the concept and existence of god has been a consistent theme for prejudice,
hate, and war on a spectrum of magnitudes; from international opposition, to one-on-one debate. Most
inter-community convictions are not spared either, as is the case amongst the brotherhood of abstract
theorists, namely, Philosophers; skeptical and divergent with both society’s and each other’s
conceptions of god, and other abstract possibilities. In this paper, I will explore the philosophical anti-
corpus conceptions of god not belonging to, but briefly described by, Spinoza, and Spinoza’s own
suggestion of a corporeal god. After expressing my criticism of Spinoza’s argument, I offer a third
possible conception of god which challenges the human need for contrast in a way that bridges the
aforementioned views of the divine; creating a hybrid concept of god which would likely convince the
late philosophers themselves if they had the opportunity to hear it.
In his Scholium to Proposition 15, Spinoza claims that all philosophical minds before him had
not attributed a physical being to god. Rather than the composition of god as a being, pre-Spinozic
philosophers argued for, or against, notions of the possibility and existence of an all-perfect and infinite
being; as well as the goodness of said being, its creative abilities, and many other qualities and
attributes. According to Spinoza, these philosophers instinctively assumed god to be body-less and
external to the physical realm because, by definition, a “body” is limited and mortal; synonymous with
ideas of a measureable mass, quantity, and duration, and therefore could not possibly be representative
of the infiniteness of god. Furthermore, their denial of a corporeal god, whether conscious or not, was

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supported by the widely-accepted notion that anything infinite is indivisible, inferring that it is
immeasurable, and therefore limitless; the opposite of what defines anything corporeal (Cahn).
Alternatively, Spinoza argued that god is in fact a physical being, the sole substance, by the
suggestion that one of god’s infinite attributes is “extension” (Cahn). If, however, the merit of
Spinoza’s argument for a corporeal god only stems from this vague notion of extension, then it is
hardly valid. In fact, in his Ethics, Spinoza’s proof of extension as an attribute of god does not even
exist. Instead, he indirectly associates it with the infinite power of god, which does not offer an
unquestionable link between the attribute of “extension” and a corporeal god. Therefore, “extension”
may in fact be an attribute of god, and of god’s ideas, yet it speaks no obvious truth to god’s form.
With this said, it was not believed that matter is “unworthy of divine nature”, but rather that a
“body” can only pertain to a finite piece of the infiniteness of god, rather than god’s entirety, which
includes, but is not solely comprised of, matter (Cahn). Yet Spinoza argued the body of god to exist as
the only substance, which grammatically reduces god to a limit of measurement. The better statement
of god is that god is substance, as god gives life to everything, and therefore everything is a part of god.
God can be found in every idea of god, yet is unchanging to the idea itself, just as the idea is
unchanging to god. The point of infiniteness is that it cannot add to, nor can they take away from, god.
An argument that would likely have been more acceptable, even by the science community, is
the suggestion of god as anti-matter. Supporting evidence for this hypothesis includes its intense power,
its mystique, and the satisfaction of the duality that we as abstract and symbolic beings are ever so fond
of.
If instead, for the purpose of further explanation, the “body” of god was represented by numbers,
and the abstract nature of god was in turn represented by negative numbers, then god would be the

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equivalent to zero. It cannot be measured, because it is where everything begins, both the existing and
non-existing, and therefore nothing can be separated from it. This is because zero is infinite just as god
is, it cannot be multiplied by any amount to produce a greater number, instead, any number multiplied
by zero, becomes zero – as it is taken from a fathomable value, to an immeasurable value with no
apparent onset or explanation. Likewise, nothing can be divided from god, as everything is a finite part
of god’s infiniteness. Anything divided from god is like a shadow divided from its solid being, formless,
and otherwise non-existent.
God, like zero, is no more physical than abstract, and no more abstract than physical, it is both,
and it is also neither; it is every side of every contradiction. Like the number zero, God’s existence is
debated, questioned, and even somewhat ironic in the sense that arguing the existence of god is
somewhat like arguing the existence of mermaids, no one has ever actually experienced them without
an extension of their 5 senses, yet our conceptions of them exist in our imaginations and popular media
enough to be considered real.
Having said this, it discounts the notions that god NOT be something, such as, existing, being
corporeal, or not being corporeal; in fact, by definition, god is everywhere and everything, as god is
void of any possible contradiction. This, then, further challenges the understanding of the infinite
perfection of god, not the restricted and stubborn belief of one definition of “perfect”. As the all-perfect
being, god must be infinitely perfect; his ideas each have their own standards of their perfect creator,
and therefore, god is all those forms of perfect, with all possible attributes, including its state of being.
Since, then, Spinoza is technically an idea of god, then Spinoza’s ideas of god must also be true, to
satisfy the notion of gods perfection.
As one of the radical thinkers of history, Baruch Spinoza offers a confident criticism of the
disregard for god’s form, which, until Spinoza, had otherwise been overlooked due to the various

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restrictions that define a “body”. Though his justification against a lack of a divine body is a strong one,
Spinoza fails to come up with a sound argument for the body of god. With such an unfinished
hypothesis, Spinoza comes up short in his defense, and so I took it upon myself to consider the
physicality of god, and offer a third view which combines the late philosophical views, and leaves no
opportunity for blind assumption. Afterall, if god is what he is meant to be, all powerful and infinite,
who are we to question god’s abilities and place restrictions only on the basis that the same restrictions
apply to our reality?
Works Cited
Cahn, Steven M., ed. "Ethics." Classics of Western Philosophy. 7th ed. N.p.: n.p., 2006. 551-95. Print.
Maitzen, Stephen. "Anselmian Atheism." Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 70.1 Jan.
(2005): 225-39. Web. 19 Nov. 2011.
<http://philosophy.acadiau.ca/tl_files/sites/philosophy/resources/documents/Maitzen_Anselmian_
Atheism.pdf>.
Philosophy PHDs. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (SEP). Ed. Edward N. Zalta, Uri Nodelman,
Colin Allen, John Fischer, Ted Cohen, etc. Stanford University, 2006. Web. 19 Nov. 2011.
<http://plato.stanford.edu/>.